Peter Templeman: Into the Void

by Steve Rockwell

Peter Templeman, Petroglyphs, 2024, acrylic on panel, 16 x 20 inches (40.5 x 51 cm)
Peter Templeman, Petroglyphs, 2024, acrylic on panel, 16 x 20 inches (40.5 x 51 cm)

In his exhibition at the Christopher Cutts Gallery, Peter Templeman, having gone “Into the Void” returns here with the painted evidence of his journey. “Big Phase No. 5” (1997), an oil on canvas measures 72 x 84 inches, and the appropriately named acrylic on canvas “Wheel” (2022), at a mere eight inches square, serve as bookends to Templeman’s odyssey. The 2024 acrylic on panel, “Petroglyphs” have the qualities of an Egyptian cartouche, its “hieroglyphs” enclosed within their customary oval. Cryptic, yet conversely transparent, the panel amounts to an artist signature or seal, somehow punctuating his work as official – as if carved in stone.

Peter Templeman, Phase No. 2, 1997, oil on canvas, 72 x 60 inches (183 x 152.5 cm)
Peter Templeman, Phase No. 2, 1997, oil on canvas, 72 x 60 inches (183 x 152.5 cm)

Centrepieces of the “Into the Void” works are four major paintings that Christoper Cutts acquired subsequent to a late 1990s visit to the artist studio. After decades in storage, these were combined and displayed here with contemporary works from Templeman’s studio. A visit by the artist by the artist to the Cutts Gallery this past winter tweaked a reminder of the stored works, thereby kicking its exhibition wheel into full gear. The “Phase Series (No. 2, No. 3, No. 4, and Big Phase No. 5)” are significant paintings in Templeman’s oeuvre. Besides their relative scale to the rest of the exhibition, they exemplify a successful synthesis of control and abandonment. Templeman’s painterly forays into his “void” divide variously into the more or less ordered. His “Paintings 1 – 9” as a group, paints the abyss as roiled chaos. His 2014 “Rocking on the High Seas” has the artist steering directly into the eye of the storm.

Peter Templeman, Rocking on the High Seas, 2014, oil on canvas, 24 x 18 inches (61 x 45.5 cm)
Peter Templeman, Rocking on the High Seas, 2014, oil on canvas, 24 x 18 inches (61 x 45.5 cm)

An unflinching resolve to go to the wall with each painterly outing is typical fare with Templeman. Relatively early in the artist’s career, the French Symbolist literature of Gide, Rimbaud and Beaudelaire, had primed the young artist to a receptivity of the unconscious realm. The “wall,” seemingly without exception here, is the dark unknown, against which every scumbled brush stroke gleams. In geologic terms, “Big Phase No. 5” may be seen as a motherlode, the artist’s repository of countless layers of paint. Their formation amounts to the congeal of phantasms into ever-shifting tectonic plates of pigment. Through a kind of alchemy, the deposit of everyday sight and sound minutiae is made precious in the act of having been made visible.

Peter Templeman, Big Phase No. 5, 1997, oil on canvas, 72 x 84 inches (183 x 213.5 cm)
Peter Templeman, Big Phase No. 5, 1997, oil on canvas, 72 x 84 inches (183 x 213.5 cm)

Templeman’s 2014 oil on panel ,”The Void,” features a window or portal. The viewer, once entered, is drawn into a vortex where tumult is the price of admission. The effect is one of tunnelling, amplifying a sense of dimension within dimensions. Here the artist is possibly throwing us the key to his creative “tripping,” with some of the GPS signposts along the way. Its loosely brushed “O” shape around the window hub might suggest the Greek last letter omega. Regardless, a sense of the cosmic is inferred with the artist stretching his craft to an existential limit. The 2015 canvasses such as “Top Knot” and “Physual” read as an interlacing of enigmatic glyphs. As syllabic utterances that coalesce, they exemplify the body of works where Templeman has tamed his tempests.

Peter Templeman, The Void, 2014, oil on panel, 42 x 36 inches (106.5 x 91.5 cm)
Peter Templeman, The Void, 2014, oil on panel, 42 x 36 inches (106.5 x 91.5 cm) 

With a 50-year-long career and many artists of note that Templeman has rubbed shoulders with, a consistency of development and vision predominates. While Graham Coughtry had impacted the artist as a student, Toronto’s Three Schools of Art introduced him to the art of John MacGregor, who’s improvisational surrealist method provided a significant building block. Templeman’s now distinct brushed iconography is part of a connective abstract tradition that threads generations.

An Afternoon with Collectors Ed Nemeth and Nancy Parke-Taylor

by Roy Bernardi and Jennifer Leskiw

We had the good fortune of meeting Ed Nemeth and Nancy Parke-Taylor at a recent art opening for Steve Rockwell, the publisher of d’Art International magazine. Ed is a semi-retired pharmacologist and Nancy has currently retired from her career as a lawyer. After much chatting with Ed and Nancy, we discovered that these two lovely people had a fabulous collection of contemporary Canadian and American art. Lucky for us, we were invited to their home to see this wonderful and eclectic collection.

I must say, the house itself is a work of art, located on a beautiful street lined with large mature trees. Although the façade of the house is somewhat modern, its large open spaces are filled with paintings, photographs, sculpture, works on paper, and art books covering almost every subject one can imagine. 

Ed Nemeth and Nancy Parke-Taylor with Tony Calzetta work
Ed Nemeth and Nancy Parke-Taylor with Tony Calzetta work

Upon entering the living room, your eye takes you to a beautiful painting by Toronto artist Tony Calzetta. It’s big and bold. Over the fireplace hangs an abstract by Toronto based artist Seo Eun Kim, who often goes by the name Sunny Kim. When viewed from afar, the surface of the painting resembles a needle point embroidery, when in fact, most of the surface is created by use of a baker’s piping bag.

Alcove with Barker Fairly paintings
Alcove with Barker Fairly paintings

The opposite side of the room has three lovely landscapes by Barker Fairley. The trio is serene and peaceful. To the left hangs a wonderful Harold Town single autographic print and below a landscape by Charles Comfort. And below to the left of that, a lovely Ray Mead ink abstract. Directly below the Fairleys sits a very large and quirky ceramic sculpture by David James Gilhooly. It’s fantastic and the juxtaposition of these works is so much fun. Also scattered among the table tops are intriguing metal sculptures by Santa Fe sculptor Kevin Box. Some of the pieces bring to mind origami works due to their extreme thinness and fine detail.

Ed Nemeth and a wall of abstract works
Ed Nemeth and a wall of abstract works

Similar to numerous collectors, Ed and Nancy’s collection comprises various pieces by the same artist, reflecting different stages of the artist’s life. Their collection features multiple works by Barker Fairley, ranging from landscapes (as depicted) to several portraits. The same goes for several pieces by Tony Calzetta from various phases of his artistic journey. A significant portion of their collection showcases multiple works by the same artist, with some displayed together while others are dispersed throughout the house, each hanging alone or in clusters in different rooms.

Robert Longo work
Robert Longo work

From here we stroll into the dining room where on one wall hangs two large scale black and white lithographs by American artist Robert Longo. The male and female are captured in a dance-like motion creating an amazing dynamism between the two. 

The opposite walls are covered in a variety of black and white photographs of various individuals including two photographs by renowned photographer Sally Mann. Among this collection is one of a young girl who once adorned the cover of an issue of American Fiction magazine. There is one striking photograph by Alfred Eisenstaedt of Dr. Joseph Goebbels, Propaganda Minister of the German Third Reich. There’s a fascinating story behind this photo. After Eisenstaedt took the photograph, there was a knock on his door one evening.  Fear engulfed him as he thought he would be arrested and taken away by the Gestapo but, to his surprise and complete relief, he was simply asked for a copy of the photograph for Dr. Goebbels’ personal collection. 

As we leave the dining room, we walk through what I would consider a reading room filled with hundreds of art books and a fabulous Janet Cardiff abstract work of art. Such a unique piece as Cardiff is primarily known for her sound performance works and videos. Cardiff, along with George Bures Miller represented Canada at the 49th Venice Biennale in 2001. Truly an amazing find. 

In this room hangs a number of photographs by Mark Hogancamp who works with toy figures, placing them in certain spaces and in certain positions in order to create a fictional city. Mark Hogancamp produced a book of his photographs titled “Welcome to Marwencol” which later became part of the idea behind the movie with Steve Carell, an American actor and comedian, called “Welcome to Marwen” released in 2018.

Belgian artist Jean Pierre Schoss blue metal sculpture
Belgian artist Jean Pierre Schoss blue metal sculpture

This room leads into the next which looks out into a well cared for garden. You’ll see a massive blue metal sculpture against the fence by Belgian artist Jean Pierre Schoss of Dog Bite Steel. His quirkiness and comedic appeal makes him look like a big, old friendly monster: he’s simply fabulous. Schoss uses recycled materials such as steel and creates fascinating creatures and animals. He feels the discarded material has a lot of character and always tells a life story. There are many smaller pieces scattered throughout this and other rooms. They’re very sweet and quite charming. But the outdoor monster is the best! 

What is intriguing about their collection is that the arrangement of the works is perfectly curated. They appear to be positioned in a way that they all complement one another, reflecting similar themes, artistic styles, and colours harmonizing seamlessly. 

What a treat it is to walk throughout the house and see works by Rita Letendre, Harold Town, Ray Mead, Barker Fairley, Robert Longo, Robert Chandler, Ian McKay, Katherine Bemrose, Steve Rockwell, Christopher Winter, Robert Marchessault, John Massey, Tim Deverell and Sally Mann, just to name a few.

Sylvia Galbraith at Abbozzo Gallery

by Emese Krunak-Hajagos

Seeing the description for Sylvia Galbraith’s Loretta’s Place in the catalogue for CONTACT 2025 I was hooked right away. Then I received an email from Abbozzo Gallery promoting Galbraith’s exhibition and the image looked as though it was in 3D—projected on the wall of the gallery. But when I finally visited the gallery, I saw the actual artwork—a large photograph on the main wall. I stood rooted in front of it, forgetting about the place and time— I just floated into its magic world.

There are two different worlds combined into that one image of a rather abandoned looking room with a bed frame, as though someone had just departed or the room was waiting for a new occupant. There is a rug on the floor and wood we expect to see on the floor now on the ceiling. But what makes this image unique is the upside-down landscape on the walls. Galbraith used a camera obscura when photographing the landscapes in Newfoundland, so the inverted images are inverted. But it is much more than that. Neither the room nor the rural landscape is interesting in its own. However, through combining them in this way, they undergo a metamorphosis. The interior opens and the landscape becomes part of the room, but not like a picture on the wall. Grass grows, buildings emerge, and we no longer know when the inside ends and the outside begins. Inside and outside become one, a mesmerizing symbiosis.

Sylvia Galbraith, Loretta’s Place, 2019, archival pigment print, 60 x 90 inches. ©Sylvia Galbraith, courtesy of Abbozzo Gallery
Sylvia Galbraith, Loretta’s Place, 2019, archival pigment print, 60 x 90 inches. ©Sylvia Galbraith, courtesy of Abbozzo Gallery

The Exhibition Statement mentions that the artist was “particularly interested in relationships between buildings and people”. However, none the photographs include people. Galbraith talks about people in their absence, like poetry does. The objects and landscapes resemble history, social status and there are real landscapes in their physicality. But what is physical? Can it be modified by our perception or even by the technique of the camera obscura? When does reality end and our dreams and memories start filling the place? In these photographs you can no longer separate them, they merge, creating an illusion that overshadows any possible reality. Looking at them you find yourself in a very different world, where interior and exterior no longer exist; an ethereal place has been created.

The title of the exhibition What Time Is This Place?, is very important. The photographs depict the rural landscape of Newfoundland in reality, as an outpost with common buildings. How do those people get here? Why? Is it an escape or a conscientious choice? Do they fit in or misplaced? We can guess their history, past and present and their social status. In Loretta’s Place the bottom of the walls in the room are sky-blue, the landscape is green, the buildings are yellow and white while the floor, the bed and the ceiling are dark, creating a dramatic contrast. The bed made me think of possible interactions between objects and people. It is just the frame, hinting at the absence of a person. But what does an absence really mean? Years ago, when I moved into my apartment, there was abandoned furniture in it that an old person left behind. For some time, I felt the presence of him, like a imprint of his memory was still there. The same is true for Galbraith photographs. Loretta might be a poor person, in a small, rural place, who still needs to buy a mattress and bed clothes. Very little else can fit into that tiny place. I think she is somewhat misplaced. This room can’t be the place she dreamed about.

Gary’s Place, Living Room (2019) is a comfortable space with a couch and framed pictures on the wall, that are overlapped with the landscape. A piano at the wall suggests that he is a music lover. His story is very different from Loretta’s. I am aware that I am creating my own narrative here, and I am sure everyone else will do the same. It is a good thing to be so deeply involved in the image.

Sylvia Galbraith, Gary's Place, Living Room, 2019, archival pigment print on Hahnemuhle Gloss paper, 24 x 36 inches. ©Sylvia Galbraith, courtesy of Abbozzo Gallery
Sylvia Galbraith, Gary’s Place, Living Room, 2019, archival pigment print on Hahnemuhle Gloss paper, 24 x 36 inches. ©Sylvia Galbraith, courtesy of Abbozzo Gallery

Some of the photographs give away their locations, like Main Road with Boats and Butterflies (2022), where the landscape is dominant. It is a nicely painted room with an antique lamp and books on a dresser, suggesting that the person who lives in it can afford beautiful, expensive things. The landscape depicts a harbor and a more populated area, a village or a small town. Butterflies fly out of the landscape, further confusing the viewer about where the landscapes ends and the interior takes over. The ceiling is another photograph that looks like a rock with some grass. It is not easy to decipher what we see or where we are.

Sylvia Galbraith, Gary's Place, Living Room, 2019, archival pigment print on Hahnemuhle Gloss paper, 24 x 36 inches. ©Sylvia Galbraith, courtesy of Abbozzo Gallery
Sylvia Galbraith, Main Road With Boats and Butterflies, 2022,
archival pigment print on Hahnemuhle Gloss paper, 24 x 36 inches. ©Sylvia Galbraith, courtesy of Abbozzo Gallery

Morning in the Red Cliffe Kitchen (2024), located in a town, where the only thing you can see is the wall and windows of the neighboring building, giving me the feeling of a suffocating, little space. Everything is old—almost grandmotherly—the stove, the couch, covered with a blanket, a chair with a pillow, the lace curtain. As in all Galbraith’s photographs, the colors are important. The vibrant reddish brown on the left contrasts the white stove, the shining kettle and the white fence, creating a quiet interior.

Sylvia Galbraith, Morning in the Red Cliffe Kitchen, 2024, archival pigment print, 40 x 60 inches. ©Sylvia Galbraith, courtesy of Abbozzo Gallery
Sylvia Galbraith, Morning in the Red Cliffe Kitchen, 2024, archival pigment print, 40 x 60 inches. ©Sylvia Galbraith, courtesy of Abbozzo Gallery

Each photograph combines the inside of a living area with the surrounding landscape, focusing on the interaction between them. Every place has a strong impact on the people occupying them. Our personality is formed by our surroundings, whether it’s a busy city with noisy traffic or the countryside with a lake or ocean. According to that we become busy, hurried or eccentric, peaceful.

Our influence on the landscape can be positive or hurtful. I also believe that we may influence the buildings we live in. Whatever we do—work, cook or play the piano—our happiness or sadness leave a print on the walls and our memories live on in them. These photographs capture these ideas beautifully. As gallery manager, Blake Zigrossi said, they are more than photographs, they are “meta-photographs”, metaphors of our life.


Sylvia Galbraith, What Time Is This Place?, May 9 – June 7, 2025, Abbozzo Gallery, 401 Richmond Street West, Suite 128, Toronto. Gallery hours: Tue – Fri 11am – 6pm, Sat 11am – 5pm.

Danielle Frankenthal: Playing with Light

by John Mendelsohn

What need do we have for words when we have paintings, particularly the kind of lyrical and abstract works that Danielle Frankenthal offers us in her current exhibition? These are often extravagant, gestural works that are abundant in high color and visual movement. What challenges the writer is to order his thoughts about paintings that seems to ask us to forsake cognition in favor of pure sensation.

Danielle Frankenthal, Mist #2, 2024, acrylic paint, oil stick on acrylic resin, 48 x 48 in.
Danielle Frankenthal, Mist #2, 2024, acrylic paint, oil stick on acrylic resin, 48 x 48 in.

But despite the pleasures of innocent, sensuous looking that these paintings afford, our enquiring mind is nonetheless activated. First, there is the question of the unusual support of these works – square sheets of clear acrylic resin that are joined into a single box. Acrylic paint and oil stick have been applied to the inner and outer surfaces of the plastic panels, resulting in a kind of painterly diorama or stage set that deploys multiple scrims. The effect is to deconstruct the traditional layering of a painting into discrete planes, that coalesce into a comprehensible, if unstable image.

Danielle Frankenthal, L'Heure Bleu, 2023, acrylic paint, oil stick on acrylic resin, 50 x 50 in.
Danielle Frankenthal, L’Heure Bleu, 2023, acrylic paint, oil stick on acrylic resin, 50 x 50 in.

This effect of suspended marks is essential to these paintings, creating a kind of holographic presence in which the painted gestures shift from planar to dimensional space. Our second question is how this curious phenomenon is part of Frankenthal’s expressive endeavor. The exhibition has work from two series, Clouds and Gardens. The former benefits from the floating quality of the multiple planes of depths in the paintings, to evoke fugitive color and atmospheric vapors.

Danielle Frankenthal, L’Apresmidi d’une Faune, (Diptych), 2024, acrylic paint, oil stick, metal gilding on acrylic resin, 50 x 50 in.
Danielle Frankenthal, L’Apresmidi d’une Faune(Diptych), 2024, acrylic paint, oil stick, metal gilding on acrylic resin, 50 x 50 in.

A prime example is Mist 2, with its upper expanse the color of agitated fog, above a lower, coppery register. In the Clouds paintings, at times light is conjured literally through the use of pearlescent and metallic pigments. The many qualities of light constitute a continual focus in Frankenthal’s work, here intimating the diffused illumination of dawn.

A painting of the Gardens series, L’Apresmidi d’une Faune, is a diptych whose title simultaneously suggests the Mallarmé poem, the Debussy symphonic work which it inspired, and the ballet of the same name by Nijinsky. The double painting repeats, with variations, a pastoral setting with a mottled sky, a gilded glow of light, and a violent red passage that suggest the satyr’s sensual exploits. Leaping arabesques in black oil stick capture the sense of intoxicated dance.

Danielle Frankenthal, Garden 3, 2024, acrylic paint, oil stick on phosphorescent acrylic resin,
50 x 50 in.
Danielle Frankenthal, Garden 3, 2024, acrylic paint, oil stick on phosphorescent acrylic resin, 50 x 50 in.

Garden 3, with its turbulent sky, rising land, and turquoise vegetation, is the most recognizable landscape of the series. It becomes a terra incognita by an overlay of wild, wind-blown lines and the use of phosphorescent acrylic resin. This glow-in-the-dark effect reminds us that this artist is both a seeker after original expression, and part of a lineage of painting that draws its inspiration from nature, stretching back to Monet, and moving forward through Joan Mitchell and Helen Frankenthaler.

Danielle Frankenthal: Playing with Light, Curated by Lilly Wei, through April 5, 2025, L’SPACE Gallery, New York, 524 W. 19 St., New York, NY

Light: Visionary Perspectives at the Aga Khan Museum

by Emese Krunak-Hajagos

The entire Aga Khan Museum was designed around light, so as its 10th anniversary approached the curators decided to celebrate it with an exhibition entirely about light.

Light is central to the museum and visitors experience it right away upon entering the building. In the hallway, To Breathe, Korean artist Kimsooja’s site-specific installation takes us to a different dimension, a dimension of magical light. The windows are covered with diffraction grating film and as daylight passes through it reveals rainbows throughout the space. The magic of this work is in making the invisible visible. Coloured light always amazes and fills us with joy. This kind of play with light can be found on many levels of the museum, shining through windows and creating its own ‘artworks’ on walls and floors.

Kimsooja, To Breathe, 2015, Site-specific installation consisting of diffraction grating film. Commissioned by Centre Pompidou-Metz. Courtesy of Institut français/Année France Corée and Kimsooja Studio. Photography Credit: Jaeho Chong.
Kimsooja, To Breathe, 2015, Site-specific installation consisting of diffraction grating film. Commissioned by Centre Pompidou-Metz. Courtesy of Institut français/Année France Corée and Kimsooja Studio. Photography Credit: Jaeho Chong.


There is nothing better than light as the focus for the anniversary exhibition. There are so many kinds: the light of the sun, the moon and the light inside us, the light we absorb and the light we radiate. The exhibition titled, Light: Visionary Perspectives, is an amazing combination of scientific and spiritual approaches, involving both historical and contemporary visions.

Tannis Nielsen’s, mazinibii’igan / a creation (2020) is the first piece I see. The Anishinaabemowin word ‘mazinibii’igan’ means “a drawing, a sketch, or a design.” It is a continuous video installation with many possible beginnings and endings. The installation is a result of Tannis Nielsen’s research into electromagnetic energies. She discovered that residual radiation stems from the Big Bang, believed to be the origin of the universe.
Stepping into the installation I am enveloped by darkness. It must be the beginning of the universe when nothing existed. Then some weak light grows, and I hang on to it with hope, as any little light is better than total darkness. Suddenly bright lights with impressive soundtracks surround me and it is almost too much, but I lose myself in this otherworldly installation and stop thinking. It surrounds me. As the story told by Elder Marie Gaudet (Turtle Clan Anishinaabe from Wikwemikong), a knowledge keeper and practitioner of healing songs and ceremonies, the installation invites us to reimagine creation. So, it seems I am inside the process of the creation that started, as the narrative says, with a single light emerging from the darkness. Am I swallowed by this installation? I feel I’m in the middle of it, totally absorbed by the darkening and lightening universe. It is a very complex world where dark, light, sound, narrative and music work together perfectly as I become part of the creation. It feels so good, uplifting and I am happy and amazed. Will I ever be able to leave it or do I want to stay inside and see what comes next? It is pulsating with energy, and I feel absorbed in it, an almost physical sensation. It is also very spiritual and mesmerizing. It was hard to distance myself from this installation and I needed some time to re-enter reality.

Tannis Nielsen, mazinibii’igan / a creation, 2020. Digital video, artist’s own footage and derivative. Story and narration by Marie Gaudet. Courtesy of Tannis Nielsen. Photography credit: Aly Manji
Tannis Nielsen, mazinibii’igan / a creation, 2020. Digital video, artist’s own footage and derivative. Story and narration by Marie Gaudet. Courtesy of Tannis Nielsen. Photography credit: Aly Manji

What I saw next, I can barely call ‘reality’ as Anish Kapoor’s two mirrors, facing each other from opposite walls, playing a game with me, challenging my perception. It is about what we see or what we think we see. Long ago Muslim philosophers thought that the light came out from our eyes. In the main floor exhibition room, the book Opticae Thesaurus addresses this idea. The title of the book is a Latin translation of Kitab Al-Manazir (Book of Optics) by 10th-century Muslim scholar and mathematician Ibn al-Haytham. He revolutionized the field by arguing that sight is made possible by light traveling to the eye, rather than by light emanating from it. His discovery influenced the western world as well and led to the development of the camera obscura and, ultimately, the modern camera.

Kapoor’s two mirrored disks, one made of steel and the other of wood and lacquer, remind me of our eyes. From their concave surface they show a view we don’t expect, seeing ourselves and the space in a different way. It is very complex. First, from a distance you see yourself upside down, then, as you get a closer look, you are standing on the ground again. The mirror is creating its own reality. Mirrors in art often denote self-reflection, so what’s happening here? Which one of the images is real or is all just visual illusion? As Bita Pourvash, Associate Curator, Aga Khan Museum says, “we also must understand that we don’t only see with our eyes but with our mind and heart and how they are connected in creating an image.”

I visited the exhibition a day before it opened, and the light was somewhat erratic, some areas a little darker. Stepping out of the view of the mirrors and looking back as they were reflecting on each other I wondered if, somehow, they communicate with each other in the dark when no one is around, sharing their experiences of us and how their tricks confused us.

Anish Kapoor, Mirror (Mipa Blue to Organic Green), 2016. Stainless steel and lacquer. On loan from George Yabu and Glenn Pushelberg. Photography credit: Connor Remus.
Anish Kapoor,Mirror (Mipa Blue to Organic Green), 2016. Stainless steel and lacquer. On loan from George Yabu and Glenn Pushelberg. Photography credit: Connor Remus.

The title A Thousand Silent Moments (Rain Forest) reminds me of Gabriel García Márquez’s book, One Hundred Years of Solitude, that also takes place in a rain forest. It is a magical story like Anila Quayyum Agha’s. Inspired by objects and paintings in the museum collections, American-Pakistani artist, Anila Quayyum Agha, created a lacquered steel and LED installation. On the walls and on the floor, we see a series of laser cut patterns of flowers, leaves and animals from various cultures and historical periods projected from the glass box in the middle of the room. A bright green light surrounds me. At first, I thought, how peaceful. Indeed, it is beautiful; it is paradise or the garden of Eden — harmony is created. Then I recognize that my shadow becomes part of the installation, appearing on the floor and on the walls. The installation is built on contrasting elements: light and shadow. They play, they change as the movement continues. It reminds me of lying under a large tree on a summer day, looking at the light coming through the leaves. It is, like this installation, wonderful and peaceful; I could enjoy it all day long. However, we all know that where there is light, there is shadow, as shadow can’t exist without light. As I walk further into the room and look in every possible direction, I become even more aware of my shadow becoming an interactive part of this installation. There is a very intense movement of images and light, everything is changing. The harmony I felt at first, suddenly breaks. I feel the opposing forces, light and shadow, including my own, as though they are in a dialog. As Quayyum Agha says about her work, “light and pattern are intentionally utilized to create ‘perceptually soothing and conceptually challenging environments.”

Anila Quayyum Agha, A Thousand Silent Moments (Rain Forest), 2024. Laser-cut resin-coated aluminum, Light Bulb. Lacquered steel and LED bulbs. Commissioned by the Aga Khan Museum. Photography Credit: Aly Manji.
Anila Quayyum Agha, A Thousand Silent Moments (Rain Forest), 2024. Laser-cut resin-coated aluminum, Light Bulb. Lacquered steel and LED bulbs. Commissioned by the Aga Khan Museum. Photography Credit: Aly Manji.

The tower-like installation, The Matriarch: Unraveled Threads, by Montreal-based Cameroonian-Belgian artist Mallory Lowe Mpoka contains more than 300 panels. The artist decided to create it when her grandmother passed away and she unexpectedly became the matriarch of her family.

The lighthouse is built from various materials and uses many mediums, like analog photography, screen printing, photo transfer, embroidery on dyed cotton and linen with red earth pigments, acrylic, paper, and steel. The fabric came from her family’s workshop in Cameroon and was dyed there with the earth. The photographs come from different sources, combining self-portraits with images from ancestral archives as well as contemporary portraits. The stories created by them are hypothetical, and do not follow any linear timeline. Together they create a circle, much like a tribal circle, where the main idea is to be together, belonging to the tribe and its history. The artist addresses the idea of how family continues to live in you and in generations to come. Not just your genes but your memories and cultural inheritance include more of the past, present and future than your individual time allows you to experience. The responsibility is to remember, share and pass down your cultural and historical inheritance. As the lighthouse guides people safely to shore, your guidance can influence coming generations to remember who they are and to make the right choices. It also reminds me of the symbol of a single candle shining in the dark. While there may be other lit candles as well, they can’t take away the light from yours. The images are illuminated from inside the lighthouse. Light, besides being a physical element in this artwork, also becomes a metaphor for enlightenment of the heart and mind.

Mallory Lowe Mpoka, The Matriarch: Unraveled Threads, 2021-2024. Analog photography, screen printing, photo transfer, embroidery on dyed cotton and linen with red earth pigments, acrylic, paper, and steel. Courtesy of the artist. Photography Credit: Rory Kearney-Fick.
Mallory Lowe Mpoka, The Matriarch: Unraveled Threads, 2021-2024. Analog photography, screen printing, photo transfer, embroidery on dyed cotton and linen with red earth pigments, acrylic, paper, and steel. Courtesy of the artist. Photography Credit: Rory Kearney-Fick.

Phillip K. Smith III’s Two Corners is a 3D work of colour-choreographed large reflective panels placed in two opposing corners of the room. It is a very intensive experience as I become a part of it when stepping into its universal space, surrounded by its ever-changing colours and interplaying light. Infinity is the right word to describe this installation. When I turned from one wall to another it seemed to open, giving me the feeling that I could walk further without any limit. The desert-like landscape horizon is confusing. I think it made me understand what a mirage really is. The changing of colors further deepens this impression. There is a blue sky filling the room for a short time, then the redness of a sunset or the greenness of fields. Sometimes the colors appear at the same time overlapping and framing each other. This shiny orgy of colors is bigger than my ‘perception’ and addresses the unconscientious layers of my brain. They instill different moods and feelings, turning my attention to these underrated territories of our minds.

Phillip K. Smith III, Two Corners, 2022. Aluminum, glass, LED lighting, electronic components, unique colour choreography. Courtesy of artist. Photography Credit: Aly Manji.
Phillip K. Smith III, Two Corners, 2022. Aluminum, glass, LED lighting, electronic components, unique colour choreography. Courtesy of artist. Photography Credit: Aly Manji.

As Marianne Fenton, Special Projects Curator, Aga Khan Museum summarized, “The installations and objects in the exhibition explore our shared humanity, encouraging us to experience light through the perspectives of these artists who have captured its emotional, spiritual, and physical presentations.” The exhibition, Light: Visionary Perspectives focuses on the power of light over darkness. Exploring both historical and contemporary understanding and creative interpretations of light. It shows us the possibility of new, hopeful horizons.

Images are courtesy of Aga Khan Museum.

*Exhibition information: Light: Visionary Perspectives, till April 21, 2025, Aga Khan Museum, 77 Wynford Drive, Toronto. Museum hours: Tue & Thu – Sun 10:30 am – 5:30 pm, Wed 10 am – 8 pm.